About Us

Michael Clarke

Professor Michael Clarke was Director General of the Royal United Services Institute from 2007-2015, where he remains a Distinguished Fellow of RUSI. He is also Fellow of King’s College London and Visiting Professor of Defence Studies. He is Visiting Professor at the University of Exeter and Associate Director of its Strategy and Security Institute, and a Fellow of the University of Aberystwyth. He is currently a Specialist Adviser to the Joint Committee on National Security Strategy in Parliament, and in 2020 was made a Fellow of the Royal College of Defence Studies.

Helen Ramscar

Helen Ramscar is an Associate Fellow of the Royal United Services Institute where previously she was Director of Development from 2017-2018. She has worked in China and Kenya, as well as the House of Commons, the Royal Household and the US Embassy in London. She is a graduate of Durham University, the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy at SOAS, and Cass Business School, UK. Currently she lives in Switzerland and is a member of the board of the Basel Chapter of the British-Swiss Chamber of Commerce.

Bloomsbury

The Challenge of Defending Britain

By analysing the costs of defence, the equipment issues, the personnel, the technical and intelligence back-up for it, and the strategies to employ military forces, this book offers a brief but rich guide to understanding an area of policy that many people find baffling.

An analysis that takes the complexity of British defence policy apart to view its anatomy and show how policy is made in this area. British defence policy is in a phase of great transition as the country confronts its Brexit future and also as world politics becomes more threatening and potentially unstable. This book uses the most up to date information to examine in a concise and readable way all the elements that go to make up Britain’s defence policy as it goes through the most significant transition since the end of the Cold War in 1991.